Sean Allen aims to run 21 marathons – Athletics news
Sean Allen, a 28-year-old teacher, who has never been a runner, has decided to run 21 Marathons in 21 days to raise funds for an 11 months old child, Alexander, who is the son of his best friend who died of a brain tumour.
Allen’s friend, Andrew Mills, was a resident of Milton Keynes who had been suffering from this ailment for long. Mills remained engaged in a long battle against his illness before he succumbed to death this year. Allen, thinking of the needs of his friend’s
son, found no other way except running a series of marathon, to raise funds for the child. Living in Australia ahead of the sad predicament, Allen has now moved to UK for accomplishing his newly recognised aim.
Sharing the reason which had encouraged him to go for the noble task, Allen told reporters, “Andrew was diagnosed with a third tumour and he lost the use of the left hand side of his body and needed a wheelchair and stair lift. I was initially going to run
to raise money for that, but never got the chance to tell him. I wanted to do something for his family.”
Allen was of the view that if he had been through the situation, he would have liked someone to ensure support for his wife and children and provide them resources for a good start in life. The money that will be raised through the marathon races run by
Allen will be put into a trust fund for Alexander, the young child, who was a mere five months old when he lost his father.
Since Allen has never been a runner prior to this experience of his, he got six months training for running a marathon in Sydney, and now he is all set to run for a total of 550 miles in 21 days.
Talking about his training and the support he has started to gather from people around him, Allen said, “Training has gone really well. There’s been a few dark periods when I was pushing it too much and my knees went and wouldn’t let me do any more. I’ve
been joined by lots of people who I’ve never met before. I’ve got about eight or nine people I’ve trained with at different times. The support I have received has been overwhelming.”
The marathon races planned by Allen will be run in South Wales, however, the teacher is also interested in having a couple of them on tracks like the London Marathon course and the course at Loughborough University, where he had become friends with Mills.
Despite the fact that Allen has never run a marathon or even a half-marathon, he is quite confident in accomplishing his targets.
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